


Remember Me

by ballofbitter



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Far Harbor, Fluff, Mild Sexual Content, Named Sole Survivor - Freeform, Robot/Human Relationships, Romance, Specific quest spoilers: read warning, far harbor spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-23
Updated: 2016-05-23
Packaged: 2018-06-10 07:59:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6946603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballofbitter/pseuds/ballofbitter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[Minor Far Harbor spoilers] Nick figures out that when fate throws you nothing but broken pieces to a much larger puzzle, the answers sometimes lie in the places he knew were there all along.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Remember Me

**Author's Note:**

> **warning:** contains brief spoilers for initial quest-line in the new far harbor dlc! If you have not gotten to the synth colony on far harbor yet I suggest you not read on if you mind spoilers. Enjoy!
> 
> note: far harbor is smacking me in the face with emotion- this was the result. If you are a fan of Nick I highly recommend it! Huge thanks to GuiltyAdonis for betaing it for me! Thanks for reading~

                The dusty sheet snapped into place on the last corner of the mattress as Adrian smoothed it out, sighing softly as she fluffed the pillow and thick blanket on top. Her tired body fell backwards on the small bed with a definite thud and a squeak from the ancient mattress, her throbbing head relaxing slightly as it hit the comfort of the old pillow. Her mind was swimming with the day’s events; the seemingly endless hordes of trappers and super mutants had given her a massive headache and she was sure that _whatever_ that fog crawler had really been would be haunting her dreams whenever she managed to sleep next.

                A hazy green glow coated the room as she opened her eyes, the rumbling in the distance the telling sign that a rad storm was brewing on the horizon. Despite the emerald glow, half of the room was still masked in complete darkness; effectively shielding the form that she knew was staring out the cracked window on the far side. She hadn’t heard her partner come in, but she knew when it was him; the stale smell of cigarettes and traces of gun smoke clinging to that old trench was enough to sate any sense of alert.

                She could hear the gentle hum of his fans in the quiet, the second rumble of thunder signaling the start of the rad storm that would soon snuff out the comforting silence.  The only movement she saw from the darkness was the flicker of her partner’s optics as he blinked suddenly, the yellow glow growing brighter as his head turned to look at her. Even in the pitch black she could see that they were downcast to the floor and the way they were blinking enough to reveal the troubled thoughts running through his mind.

                Adrian had learned that Nick’s eyes were all she needed to know exactly what the detective was thinking, even if his face was just as expressive as any human’s. His eyes told her the entire story, even if their owner was not entirely intent on sharing. It was one of the things that she hated that she loved about him, that instinctual drive to put everyone else’s needs above his own enough to frustrate her into loving him even more.

                He blinked again, continuing to stare at her from across the small room they had rented for the night in The Last Plank. Seeing those eyes that brought her a feeling of safety looking so disturbed was enough to make her heart clench up in her chest.

                Ever since the first whispers of notice of their _true_ partnership had circled back to her from the numerous settlements they visited together, Adrian maintained that the unearthly glow from his eyes and his damaged skin were not unsettling, but one of many things she loved about him- Nick _the synth_. She knew that the detective still struggled with the thought of them together, even if he would never voice it for fear of hurting her, but it was the furthest thing from her thoughts when she listened to the rhythmic pumping of coolant through his chest.

                “Nick-” The word through the thick silence like a knife, the hesitation in her voice evident as she shifted slightly in order to make room on the small bed. “Do you…want to come to bed?”

                She almost cringed at her own proposition to the synth, the hesitation in her voice making her face flush in embarrassment as she saw him move all of a sudden. Nick walked from the shadows into the dim green light from the window, and when she got a good look at his face; her suspicions were confirmed.

                “Oh, _Nick_ -”

                Nick’s furrowed brows and his frown were enough to make her heart shatter, the look of sheer loss and confusion in his weathered features encouraging her to her feet. She didn’t hesitate to reach out and wrap her arms tightly around his neck, easing her partner close enough into her embrace to jostle his battered fedora backwards, revealing the x-shaped scar across his forehead. The detective bowed his head into the embrace, his nose buried in his companion’s neck. He sighed deeply, inhaling the faint smell of soap and blood that seemed to cling to her like grime.

                Adrian held him for what felt like hours as the two stood unmoving in the faint glow from the storm raging outside, another crack of thunder signaling it growing stronger. She brought her arms underneath Nick’s in order to get a better grip on her lover, only moving to press a gentle kiss to the x on his forehead. The kiss caused the detective to stir lightly in the embrace, and he pulled back slightly in order to look her deep into her eyes, his brows furrowed in discomfort.

                “Do you… wanna talk about it?” Adrian tried, frowning as she tried to assess what her partner was thinking. She had been worried about him ever since they had made it back to Far Harbor from Acadia; almost their entire trip had been taken in silence except for the occasional warning of something lurking in the shadows. He had trailed a far bit back from her, their usual tender hand-holding forgotten as they had walked through the foggy, unforgiving night.

                It gutted Adrian to think she might have had done something to scare him off. It had taken her forever to convince the synth that she _wanted_ to hold his hand, was proud to call him her partner, among other things, and _wanted_ people to see them together when they weren’t in immediate danger while travelling. Wordlessly she’d paid for the room; he had disappeared back into the night soon after, immediate concern washing over her until she’d sensed him return a little over an hour later.

                Her question tightened his arms around her waist, the noticeable squeeze causing him to sigh, the heat from his mouth on the back of her neck causing her to shiver slightly. Pulling back from the embrace, Nick sat down on the small cot, sadly looking at his hands he rested on his knees.

                “To be perfectly honest, I don’t know if I want to think about it anymore, doll. I did a lot of that in the last hour or so, and my head is just _swimmin’._ ”

                Adrian reached out in order to grab at his folded hands; threading her small fingers around his, she gave them a squeeze.

                “Maybe I can help you swim.”

                Nick’s eyes drifted slowly over in order to look at her, a small smile making an appearance on his face as he pulled his fedora forwards to straighten it. He closed his eyes and the stutter she could hear from his fans told her he was thinking. “Damn you for always knowin’ what to say to keep me smiling.”

                “What don’t you want to think about?” she tried again, her blue eyes soft as she wrapped a supportive arm around her partner’s shoulders. “I did say we’d talk later, but you didn’t really _talk_ to me, Nick. Are you shocked that you didn’t know you weren’t the only prototype the Institute made? Are you…having doubts you can call him your _brother_?” She really hoped it wasn’t the latter; she wanted him to believe that he was just as entitled to family as _anyone_ was.

                Nick was silent for a moment until he rested his head wearily on his partner’s shoulder; his eyes closed slightly as he stared at the split floorboards underneath them. “No. When he said… that… my memory drives are limited.The thought that someday… I could lose memory of everything that I am. That someday I could lose memory of the _one thing_ that matters most to me- that’s _mine_ \- something I’ve waited my entire life for-gone. Just because I’m a synth. It _kills_ me, doll.”

                Adrian frowned, something in her gut twisting painfully as she reached out towards him “ _Nick-_ ”

                “Why can’t I remember anything _about_ him, Adrian? W-why is it all such a hazy blur? You’d think I’d be able to remember someone _helping_ me escape that goddamn torture farm, but someone as close as for him to call me his _brother_? Why can’t I remember _anything_? It’s drivin’ me absolutely nuts.”

                She didn’t know what to say. For the first time—from her days as a biting prosecution lawyer in the courtroom to her present status as the sarcastic sole survivor of a pre-war vault—Adrian was completely speechless. She could only squeeze their entwined hands encouragingly as she rolled over, her own thoughts racing as she tried to think of what she could possibly say to her partner. The entire situation struck her as almost unbelievable, but at the same time, in some way, it made complete sense.

                _Were_ his memories truly limited?

                “What does all of this mean for me, _us_? In twenty years are you gonna have to stick a buncha tubes in my head and wire me up to some sort of external drive just for me to be able to remember the agency, our anniversary- the colour of your _eyes_? How much I love the way your nose crinkles when you’re worried? I-” Nick brought his forehead to his knees, his shoulders taut. She could hear the audible whir of his fans grow stronger with the intensity of his deep sigh.

                Her small hands wound around his shoulders, and with a gentle tug she pulled the detective in close, pushing his fedora back enough again so that she was able to pull it off his head in one swift motion and set it to the other side of the small cot. Nick’s glowing eyes only watched her as she leaned in in order to place a soft kiss to the side of his nose.

                “And in twenty years, are you going to help me aim my rifle? Because by then, I’m _positive_ I’ll have lost an arm, an eye, or _both_. And in forty years, are you going to help me pop my hip back into place? Or on the off chance that I became a ghoul, in two _hundred_ years are you still going to want to kiss this face?” She laughed dryly at her own joke, briefly pausing in order to see the small smile and chuckle from Nick as he buried his face into her shoulder. “Because Nick, I don’t know about you, but- I’m in this for the long haul. No matter how many tubes and wires you may or _may not_ ever need. I love you for your heart of gold; I don’t care what it’s made of.”

                Nick made a noise into her shoulder that was a mixture of a sigh and laughter, his shoulders relaxing slightly under her touch. “Aluminum, most likely.”

                Adrian laughed at the joke and pressed their foreheads together affectionately, smiling as she brought their mouths together in a gentle kiss before both hands fell to a rest at the back of his neck. “There he is.”

                “How did an old synth like me get so lucky as to land a gal like you?” Nick mused, the smile she hadn’t seen since they’d arrived on the island finally making an appearance.

                “I ask myself that every day about you. But that’s the beauty about _life_ , Nick: we don’t have to think about that part. We can just enjoy that it happened.”

                Glowing eyes narrowed slightly as he stared at the woman sitting next to him on the small bed, the thick, tense silence that had fallen over the darkened room fading into the darkness as Nick leaned in to gently bring them together in a desperate kiss. His internals whirred as he felt the familiar burn deep in his core, his mechanical hand gently caressing the back of his partner’s neck as they came together.

                Adrian was caught off guard at the shift in mood but gladly obliged him, her bottom lip searching to deepen the kiss as the two detectives shifted back in order to fall against the bed. The resounding loud squeak of the mattress caused the two to pause before breaking out in laughter at the loud noise, a muffled warning bang from the next room making them laugh harder.

                Nick rolled over to the side of the small cot closest to the wall and could only stare at the woman lying next to him, the glowing from his eyes softening as the two stared at one another in silence for what felt like hours. It was Adrian that brought them together again, this time sliding her fingers around the first button of Nick’s faded shirt collar before pausing briefly to wait for the synth’s approval. Nick hummed as he leaned in to deepen the kiss, sitting up to help his companion shrug his battered trench loose from his shoulders. It fell at the end of the bed with a soft rustle, his suspenders following soon after. He watched intently as his companion slipped the thick, worn out cardigan she wore at night to the floor, discarding her worn vest and faded red tank top with it.

                The smile she flashed him made something in his chest clench, her unruly red hair tousled as she leaned down to lay on the pillow. Her grin spread as she gingerly pushed her bra straps off her shoulders. Nick’s gleaming eyes tracing over the sea of freckles dotted all along her chest and breasts. She'd remarked to him numerous times that she had always been self-conscious of the seemingly endless freckles, as well as the relatively new large scar across her abdomen that she’d earned in an encounter with a deathclaw, but he couldn’t love them more. Every time he made sure to kiss every scar, bruise, every last inch of his partner’s flawless skin.

                Adrian finished with the last button on his dirtied white shirt and pulled it open to reveal a myriad of scrapes, dents, and holes of his own etched into his pale skin. She smiled and rolled over and gently shoved the detective to the mattress with another pained squeak, her ruffled auburn locks hanging in front of her face. She hovered over him and with a small smirk assessed his own constellation of scars, running her small hands down his torso.

                “Y’know, Nick,” she whispered as she began to pepper kisses down his chest, “If you ever ended up needing them, all those tubes sure could make things _interesting_ -”

                 Nick’s face twisted and he groaned in embarrassment, his partner laughing hysterically until he proceeded to hit her numerous times with the pillow they shared. He tried not to laugh as he hid behind his arm, the woman that had been hovering over him cackling as she desperately tried to catch her breath.

                 “I’m going to pretend I never _heard_ that, darlin’.” Nick smiled, leaning back against the rusted frame of the small bed in order to take in what he had believed for so long that he didn’t deserve, what he _couldn’t even imagine_ that he would ever be able to have found in such a life. As she leaned in to kiss him again Nick closed his eyes, reveling in the way his heart raced and fans struggled to keep up with the heat surging through his body.

                 His metal hand hesitated only for a second before he reached up to gently unhook the dark coloured bra to reveal the last of her freckles. He pulled back from the kiss in order to look his partner in the eyes, the murky blue slightly confused by the sudden retreat. The synth’s skeletal hand paused at the back of her neck, his heart thudding away in his chest as he leaned in in order to press their foreheads together.

                “Thank you, doll. For remindin’ an old synth he’s exactly where he belongs.”

                The two moved together in a way that much resembled the seamless way they could work together on cases, two hearts coming together to flutter in unison as remaining clothes were shed. Time seemed to move at a standstill as silence overtook the room again, the gentle cracking of thunder in the distance signaling the dispersal of the radstorm that had been raging over the small town. Rain started to patter against the windows as Adrian’s form kissed down her lover’s torso, the stutter she could feel from his processor beneath his pale skin enough to urge her hips against his faster in order to bring him to a place she knew he needed to be.

                A place in her heart no one else could ever fit just right in.

                She couldn’t place how long it had been since she had heard the rain start. She was burning alive as they came down from their high, her chest heaving as she shifted down on the small cot enough in order to wrap her arm tightly around Nick’s torso. His fans whirred so loudly she could probably hear them from the opposite side of the room, and his own torso rose and fell with the heat that had built up in his system. She heard him sigh pleasantly as he closed his eyes, bowing his head slightly so he could comfortably rest his chin in her messy auburn locks. He gently placed a kiss on the top of her head and Adrian’s eyes fluttered closed, the feeling of his heart beating and fans whirring enough to remind her of the slumber she desperately needed.

                When he felt the soft exhale that told him she was asleep, Nick’s glowing eyes lazily slid open, his heart still thudding in his chest as he tightened his grip on the woman he loved, the woman he was lucky enough to call his own.

                And in that moment, he knew that it was something he would never be able to forget.


End file.
